View down Rudi's Run across the resort. Storm Peak and Four Points lift areas shown
My annual Taos trip (and the mini-gathering) had to be scrapped this year, due to New Mexico travel restrictions. So I pivoted and decided to visit some place I've been wanting to go for a long time... Steamboat. I was able to rebook my New Mexico flight to Hayden, and found a good deal on an almost-slope-side condo, and headed out on Saturday morning, January 30th.
Steamboat was great.... and I got a little bit of everything. Sun, clouds, snow, whiteout, trees, groomers, ice, rocks, dirt, and a powder day. I skied some with @MattSmith, @Bruuuce and Kathy, and @Ron and had a terrific week.
Steamboat's layout is a little less straightforward than some other places, and took a couple of days to get my bearings - and I usually am pretty good at getting around. The lifts face different directions and are all over the place a bit. Here's a FATMAP view showing the different aspects from the overhead view. Made sense after a couple of days.
Sunday, January 31st
My first ski day was Sunday, and Steamboat had gotten a few inches on Saturday, so things were in relatively good shape and it was a beautiful sunny day. I met up with @MattSmith, and then @Bruuuce and his wife Kathy and we had a great day checking out the mountain. The place was only a little crowded - kind of typical liftlines, with partly-to-full corrals. And we avoided Morningside area because they had "long lift line" signs up at the entrances. We skied a few trees, but I was definitely still getting my legs under me, between not skiing too much this year, and a bit of altitude.
Trees off the Sundown lift
Trees off the Sundown lift
Bruce in the Sunshine area, with Rendezvous Lodge in the background
Bruce and Matt after coming out of the trees
Kathy in Olympic trees. This area has some signs dedicated to local Olympians here and there in the trees.
Typical lift line... a few minutes... not too bad!
Matt, Bruce, and Kathy ... great to ski with all of them again!
Sunshine area was a little crowded at times
Monday - Wednesday, February 1st - 3rd
I skied with Matt on Monday, solo on Tuesday, and finally skied with @Ron on Wednesday. And for some reason took progressively less pics throughout the week.
On Monday we got back in Morningside area for a few laps. It's a really nice area... steepish at the top and very mellow the rest of the way. It's pretty short though - only like 500 feet of vertical and I do wish it were taller. But we found some decent snow in some of the treed areas, and there was not much in the way of lift lines. Other than that we mostly stuck to the groomers, and I got to see more of the mountain. And on the runout to the base, a momentous occassion for me - I finally saw a moose in the wild! I've been wanting to, and have been in places in New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, Montana, Wyoming, Alaska, and Colorado where there's a good chance of seeing one - and somehow had never seen one. But there was one grazing not too far off the cat track at Steamboat.
View looking back up the Morningside lift area. Some of these lightly treed areas skied nicely.
View down into town
MOOSE! This was off the cat track back to the base on the north side of the resort (B.C. Ski Way)
Tuesday was a definite groomer-zoomer day... skiing solo I just went all over trying to hit some runs I hadn't hit before, and find some easy bumps. Which I did - it made for a good day and I hit 19K of vert, which is good for me. I took the Gondola for the only time of the week, as there was no line at all and I walked right on in the morning. A few of the runs were pretty brown, and I ticked a lot of little rocks... it was really surprising for mid-winter in Colorado... it looked like spring in places.
View down to the base from the end of the walk from the condo
View of the Ski Inn from the Gondola
Requisite Ski Talk sticker shot!
Nice views from a lot of the runs
Panorama in Sunshine
Some rough patches - it's been a terrible snow year
Looking dowhill in Morningside
Snack break!
Groomer panorama
On Wednesday, I hit some pretty nice groomers in the early morning off Thunderhead and Storm Peak (and a really crappy one), and then met up with @Ron in the Sunshine area. We skied a few laps, and actually did some practice and drills a bit (nothing too hard or done too seriously though
). I usually take a few lessons every year (this would have been my Taos Ski Week) so was happy to spend some time actually thinking about how I ski, and getting some tips from Ron. We stopped when several of the lifts went on wind hold, as the front rolled in and the sky darkened - Thursday was going to be a powder day!
Storm rolling in - the upper lifts were on wind hold at this point
Thursday, February 4th
Powder day! Powder day! Powder day!
Steamboat reported 6.5", but 8-10" up higher. It was a Thursday, and there was even more snow predicted for the next couple of days, so the mountain wasn't too crowded. I took the Christie Peak chair to Thunderhead and went over to Sundown and Sunshine. The snow was great, and I took a few laps in Sunshine heading down some of the off-piste and trees. After a few turns I was getting my "powder legs" under me - I don't get to do it very often, so I'm still learning. I did several laps on Sunshine with no line, including Olympic trees again and skied them much better. I then met up with Bruce again and we did a few more laps with reasonable lift lines (not even full corrals) - the trees off Quickdraw were great, and some other little tree shots were very nice. After 7 or 8 laps in Sunshine in the pow and trees, I was very tired, so we started heading back as sun came out. It was a great day.
Morning lift line at Christie Peak. The gondola line was somewhat crazy.
Great snow in some little run off Tomahawk
Some open trees in the Sunshine area
Some open trees in the Sunshine area
I love when I stop for pics and can't see my skis
Trees off of Quickdraw were terrific
More trees somewhere in Sunshine
Bruce in the trees
Sun in the valley while we still were in clouds on the mountain
Bruce looking at town on the last run down
Friday, February 5th
I drove back to Hayden Friday morning and it was snowing the whole way. Folks on the hill were having an even bigger powder day, and Saturday would be a big one too. My flight on Friday was delayed a bit by the weather/de-icing, but we got out in time for me to just make my connection in Dallas back to DC. The drive from Steamboat to Hayden was fine, even with the snow, and the rental SUV I had did just fine. I got home Friday night after a great week.
Some other random thoughts...
Lodging
I stayed at the Ski Inn, which was a short walk to get to the slopes up a cat track, and was then (as you might expect) ski-in. I thought it was a pretty good deal, because of COVID and because I booked it late.
Food
I ate in every night, and just snacked on the mountain. There are two grocery stores very close to the mountain, so it was easy to pick things up when needed. It worked out well. On the mountain, there was plenty of outside seating for a break, snack, or getting some take-away food at places that were open. I only brought my own snacks though.
Lift Tickets
I was on Ikon, so no issues there. I did check online prices, just out of curiosity, and if I had purchased lift tickets for the 5 days I skied, it would have been a bit over $1000, even with the multi-day discount.
Flying
I was very happy to have flown to Hayden rather than Denver. It's nice not to have a few hours drive on top of the flight. Hayden is small but has a lot of flights and the drive to Steamboat is mostly flat and easy.
Thanks to @MattSmith, @Bruuuce, and @Ron for a great week!
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